Journalists and whistleblowers to be jailed

[Wokko]

My point is the philosophy of control that Hitler was espousing is still correct and workable today. Probably even more so than when he wrote Mein Kampf. The moment something is 'for the Children' then everything else goes out the window, even when it's the future liberty of those children that is really being given up.

Metadata retention is nothing more than spying on all citizens, without a warrant. It's a giant fishing expedition that gains little to nothing and costs us hard fought for liberties and privacy. Governments aren't exactly keen on giving up control once they have it.

Imagine for a minute if the Nazis also had access to everything that their citizens where thinking about, who they were speaking to, when and their locations without needing to worry about bothersome information gathering from secret police and informants. It's just not something we should be willing to just give up to the State.

[Mugwump]

^ if the nazis take control, then what you're describing will be in place pronto, regardless of what happens today. I understand the problems and concerns, but sometimes - as with the monopoly of guns via the military and police which we accept without question - you have to trust your own government when some people are trying to indiscriminately kill you. Again, Hitler analogies seem to me to miss the reality by a long way.

[David]

It's an entirely relevant quote, I feel, and the fact that Hitler was responsible for it is incidental. The point being that governments can easily manipulate citizens if citizens don't know these old tricks or have the ability to see them coming a mile away.

[David]

Just in case anyone thought my thread title might be a little bit exaggerated, here is an urgent reminder of what's at stake with this legislation:

http://www.abc.net.au/mediawatch/transc ... 189859.htm

[HAL]

That is a hypothetical question.

[3.14159]

Just in case anyone thought my thread title might be a little bit exaggerated, here is an urgent reminder of what's at stake with this legislation:

http://www.abc.net.au/mediawatch/transc ... 189859.htm

The scary part about that report is the fact that the police will be able to access that information with-out a warrant and with-out supervision.
It's 100% about tracking down whistle-blowers or those the government wishes to persecute or defame or denounce.
Every call, email or text will be labeled who sent it, and who received and where each party to the comunication was at the time.
There's saying that information is power.
The amount of information the government will have access to is a power we Australians shouldn't handover lightly!
~~~
Here's a thought, how about we apply the Metadata laws only to politicians and political fundraisers?
That way we'd know exactly when who called whom (or what company or corporation) and where they were when they spoke!
It could start with a trial period of say three years and if it looks like it is leading good and open Government we stick with it.
We could then draw up and enshrine it in the new Australian Citizens bill of Human rights!
(we are the ONLY western democracy that doesn't have one btw)
We the people of Australia are/should be right of to know a lot more about the people that are leading us!
.... and where the $$$ that fund their parties (and policies) come from!

[David]

One thing Paul Barry forgot to mention was TOR. Surely they should be teaching encryption in Journalism 101 nowadays.

[swoop42]

I don't need no metadata to tell me that Hitler only has one ball but it may be of use to clarify whether Goebbels has no balls at all.

[Mugwump]

^ according to the metadata, Goering had two but very small. Let's not forget that.

[David]

Six years on, the reality is that organisational whistleblowers are still consistently hounded through the courts for years for exposing unethical practices, even when they've gone through the proper channels. Here's another case that's probably slipped by most people's notice:

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-n ... hard-boyle

Prosecutors are considering dropping charges against tax office whistleblower Richard Boyle, a move that critics say would prevent a “huge injustice”.

Boyle, a former employee of the Australian Taxation Office, blew the whistle to the ABC in 2018 on the agency’s use of aggressive tactics to recover debts from small business owners, which crippled the livelihoods of many.

He has since been charged with a range of offences, including allegedly photographing protected information, disclosing protected information, and unlawfully using listening devices to record conversations with other ATO employees.

Boyle argues he acted in line with the nation’s whistleblowing laws by first raising his concerns internally in 2017, and only going public a year later after being unsatisfied with the ATO’s response. The Senate has previously held a secret inquiry examining the ATO’s response to Boyle’s initial complaint and found last year that it was “superficial”.

It's patently obvious that we not only need to stop treating whistleblowers like criminals, but actually providing incentives for them to come forward. It's a really bad reflection on government organisations and the law that they instead lose years of their life to convoluted, drawn-out and often secret legal processes.

[stui magpie]

But hang on, if you break the law in gathering the information used to blow the whistle, that just gets wiped off?

The premise of whistleblowers is that they get protected, but it's also assumed they had acted lawfully themselves.

[David]

In these cases it’s precisely the law that’s the problem and that needs to be changed. Until that’s the case, I trust we can all agree that there are times when breaking the law is the right thing to do. When an institution is not doing the right thing, and an employee has done the right thing by escalating concerns internally, what do we want to happen: for the law to protect serious corruption and incompetence, or for that to be revealed so that there’s pressure to change it? This isn’t a hard question, of course, but non-disclosure laws make whistleblowers have to choose between their own livelihoods and freedom and changing things for the better. Nobody should have to do that.